Clinical, social and rehabilitation status of long-term home parenteral nutrition patients: results of a European multicentre survey

Background: Home parenteral nutrition (HPN) is a lifesaving treatment in patients with intestinal failure. Dependency of nutritional support becomes permanent for the majority of patients who had received HPN for at least 2 years. The alternative to long term HPN in selected patients is intestinal transplantation. Aims: To study some of the clinical, social and rehabilitation aspects of long-term HPN treatment. Methods: A survey was performed in nine European HPN centres. The questionnaire covered epidemiologic data, underlying diseases, intestinal anatomy, nutritional support and status, marital status, rehospitalization rate, HPN complications, rehabilitation score, drugs use, coexistent diseases and interest in intestinal transplantation. For some items, data were collected within 12 months prior to the evaluation. Results: This survey included 228 patients with a median age of 49 years. The median duration of HPN was 7 years (range 2-24 years). Short bowel length less than 100 cm was reported in 65% of patients with a predominance of end-jejunostomy or jejuno-colonic anastomosis. Global subjective nutritional status was normal in 79% of the patients, who were supplied with a mean number of 5.6 bags of parenteral nutrition weekly. Rehospitalizations within the 12 months prior to evaluation accounted for a mean period of 23 days and were dare to HPN complications in half of the cases. Catheter-related sepsis was the most frequent HPN-complication. Bone metabolism disorders, which seemed to be more common than liver diseases, were directly related to HPN duration. One-third of the HPN patients was regularly consuming analgesics or opiates. HPN impair complete rehabilitation status but may improve the status of patients who had a very low rehabilitation score before starting HPN. An interest of intestinal transplantation was noted in only 10% of medical teams and in 8% of HPN patients. Conclusions: This study is the largest European survey on long-term HPN patients with long standing or permanent intestinal failure. Data enlighten clinical, social and rehabilitation aspects of patients who could face the option of intestinal transplantation in the future. (C) 2001 Harcourt Publishers Ltd.